Super slow iMac G5

Hi all,

I have a problem with a 20" iMac G5. Since installing Leopard, the system has been crawling.

Just plugging in a USB memory stick produces a spinning beach ball for 10-15 seconds. Launching programs takes an age as well. But, once it's going, it seems ok (until you launch another program, or do something else).

The iMac in question is fairly low on RAM - it's only got 512MB. Is that likely to be the cause, or is it something else? Aside from being slow, the system is fairly well maintained. All patched and up to date, malware free, etc.

Some further info:

• About this Mac
• Activity Monitor showing user processes
• Activity Monitor showing all processes

Get more RAM max it out.

Yes - you need a lot more memory...

Slap in at least 2GB.

Thanks all.

2GB has been ordered. (That's the most you can put in, actually.)

Will let you know the results...

You should notice some improvement!

Yes, it's definitely faster. It still takes a little while to launch programs in the first instance, but I guess that's the cost of having a 5 (?) year old iMac. Once launched, though, switching between programs is fine. I did the USB memory stick test again, and that was almost instant.

Thanks all.

How much space do you have left on the disk. MBs and percentage?

48GB (30%) free disk space.

Have you tried
Disk Utility
select the disk and then run
Verify Disk

this will check to see if there is any issue on the data structure - if there is it could slow the machine down.